entresol

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

n. The floor just above the ground floor of a building; a mezzanine.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

n. A mezzanine; an intermediate floor in a building, typically resembling a balcony. Most often used to refer to the floor immediately above the ground floor and below a higher floor.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

n. A low story between two higher ones, usually between the ground floor and the first story; mezzanine.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

n. A low story between two others of greater height, especially one so treated architecturally that from the exterior it appears to form a single story with the one below it; a low apartment or apartments, usually placed above the ground floor. Also entersole, mezzanine story.

Etymologies

(American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

French (Wiktionary)

Examples

(I should have prefaced this anecdote by saying, for the benefit of those readers who have never been in Paris, that the entresol is a low story just over the shops, and that the Rue de Rivoli is one of the noisiest streets in the city.) -- "But Feuillet has leased the third and fourth floors: why don't you receive up there?" responded the visitor.

In my confusion I imagined, a moment before the assailants entered the Queen's apartments, that my sister was not among the group of women collected there; and I went up into an 'entresol', where I supposed she had taken refuge, to induce her to come down, fancying it safer that we should not be separated.

She made a formal declaration that her Majesty, with the assistance of Madame Campan, had packed up all her jewelry some time before the departure; that she was certain of it, as she had found the diamonds, and the cotton which served to wrap them, scattered upon the sofa in the Queen's closet in the 'entresol'; and most assuredly she could only have seen these preparations in the interval between seven in the evening and seven in the morning.

The shop and entresol at that time were tenanted by a tinman; the landlord occupied the first floor; the four upper stories were rented by very decent working girls, who were treated by the portress and the proprietor with some consideration and an obligingness called forth by the difficulty of letting a house so oddly constructed and situated.

The two prisoners had hardly been locked up when she was dressing herself in a low, damp entresol over one of those foul shops where remnants are sold, pieces stolen by tailors and dressmakers — an establishment kept by an old maid known as La